Read Online Life is Sweet by Elizabeth Bass - Free Book Online Page B

or another, either under their own steam or at the behest of an ambitious stage parent.
    â€œWe have lots of candidates, but it’s early days yet, and frankly, we’re hoping to find someone who can add a little sass to the lineup.”
    â€œI’m not sassy, or bitchy,” Becca said. “Or if I am, it’s just something I do as a non-professional now, for free.”
    â€œWell, why give it away?” Renee asked. “Sell it, honey!”
    Even as a joke, the insinuation that she should just pimp herself out for financial gain made it all that much easier for her to bring the conversation to an abrupt end. “Thanks for calling, but as I said, I’m not interested. At all. In fact, I’m very busy right now and need to go.”
    As she clicked the End Call button, she could still hear the tinny voice of Renee Jablonsky bleating at her through the device’s tiny speaker.
    She blew out a breath.
    Walt angled a glance her way. “Something wrong?”
    â€œOh no. Just a nuisance call.”
    â€œYou get lots of those?”
    â€œNot really, no.” She frowned. “Why would I?”
    â€œI don’t know.” He shrugged. “Unless it’s on account of you were on television.”
    She felt astonished, and suspicious again. Just whom had she invited into her life? “When did you find that out?” she asked him.
    â€œI knew from looking at you. There are televisions everywhere, even in jails.”
    â€œAnd yet you let me think that you were just a harmless guy sitting on a bench in front of the store. Pam worried you were a bum, but it turns out you’re something even worse—a stalker.”
    â€œNo, I’m not.” He eyed her clutching the phone, ready to call 911. “I don’t care that you were on TV. But it’s a fact, isn’t it?”
    â€œYes, it’s a fact. And you didn’t mention it.”
    â€œI didn’t think you would have wanted me to.”
    â€œIs this some kind of shakedown? Because let me assure you, the expression ‘blood from a turnip’ would not be out of place in any kind of extortion scheme involving my finances at the moment.”
    â€œI don’t want anything. You talked to me yesterday, and offered me a ride home,” he reminded her. “ You told me to come in today.”
    True. Still, a part of her brain wondered if this man had mastered some kind of circumstantial jiujitsu that allowed him to be in the right place at the right time to play on her sympathy and get her to invite him into her life. Which she never should have done. She saw that now. It was madness. She should have given him a twenty-dollar bill to assuage her guilt and then left him alone.
    â€œLook, I know I asked you to come work here, but maybe it would be best if we—”
    â€œSet some ground rules?” he asked, cutting her off. “Fine by me. I won’t mention television again. Heck, I don’t even like TV.”
    â€œThat wasn’t really what I—”
    â€œAnd if you want, I’ll tell you all about what I did, because you got a right to know.”
    She thought about this. If he tried to candy-coat his crimes, she would know right off that he was not only a criminal, but an unreformed weasel. “What did you do?”
    â€œArmed robbery. Well, actually, I had a drug possession before that. Then, I got caught robbing a liquor store with a buddy. But I can’t even say that it was all his idea and I just drove the car or something like that. I planned it. I got us the guns we used. I was cranked up on coke, which doesn’t excuse anything. But just so you know.”
    Okay, maybe passing the buck wasn’t his style. The man still had serious problems. He made her uneasy. Probably had something to do with the words armed, robbery, and cranked up on coke .
    â€œI’m clean now, though,” he assured her. “Have been for over a decade.